Arnett Lewis was the first board president of the newly-formed People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond, Inc., in 1980. Jim Dunn and Ron Chisom had met Arnett in the late 1970’s when they were introduced to each other as a part of the United Methodist Voluntary Services (UMVS), based in New York City and administered by Shelia Collins. UMVS was a group of organizations from all over the United States, what we called “grass roots” and “community-based.” They believed in community organizing and challenging local power structures. Arnett represented The United League of Holmes County, Mississippi; Jim Dunn represented HUMAN (Help Us Make A Nation) out of Yellow Springs, Ohio, and Ron Chisom represented the Treme Community Improvement Association in New Orleans.
Arnett, a big bear of a man and a former Marine, had returned from Vietnam determined to work for justice and equity in the city of his birth, Lexington, Mississippi. Black people were just beginning to exercise some power in the electoral processes of the state and knew any leverage they might have depended on maximizing numbers. Arnett formed the United League in Holmes County and joined with other groups around the State using the same United League logo. Successful boycotts of white-owned businesses followed; the racial hegemony of white supremacy was at least threatened. Electoral politics emerged as another arena where organizing could shift power relationships.
Jim and Ron felt Arnett embodied the principles under-girding what became The People’s Institute: understanding and analyzing power, and the efficacy of community organizing. Arnett was an inveterate storyteller who understood culture as that which gave people a sense of their own power in the context of their history under white supremacy. The United League of Holmes County Mississippi further developed leadership which lives on today through such groups as Southern Echo and Mississippians United for Justice.
In 1996, Arnett married Esther Yazzi, an indigenous Dene’ tribal leader, and moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico until his passing in 2018.
— Written by Rev. David Billings, longtime PISAB core trainer/organizer
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